A Hundred Alternatives
by ofalexandra
Summary: Because they are the Doctor and Rose Tyler, and they love in so many more ways than just one. Anthology series. AU.
1. Boxed

******Now taking requests**! Just submit your Title, Prompt (photo/text/anything), and any Special Requests (bear in mind that I only write Doctor/Rose!), and I'll see what I can do!

Standard disclaimers apply.

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><p><em><em>

**1. Boxed**

Prompt: _The stuff of legends is nothing but the fodder for nightmares and horror stories_.

Special Requests: From Martha's POV, either 9/Rose or 10/Rose. BAMF!Doctor and lots of angst.

Prompter: Darling Anna!

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><p><em>0755hrs, Day One<em>

Martha Jones has always known what she wanted, and has systematically and determinedly worked her way towards achieving it. She has always wanted the best, to _be_ the best, and today, she has all of those things. She has just been assigned to the same team as the lauded and famous Agent Smith, who is known for only taking _the best._ She tries not to fidget as she waits in the conference room for the others. She is good at what she does. She is professional. She is cool. She is calm.

She is new to the team, and the most inexperienced of the three-man cell, but she promises herself that she will not let them down. She will not let herself down. She has fought too hard, worked too many late nights to get this opportunity. At five minutes to oh-eight-hundred, the chrome door of the conference room swings open, and she finds herself confronted with Agent Harkness, one of the most celebrated hand-to-hand combat fighters and agents the MI6 has ever had. _The Man Who Can't Be Killed,_ his enemies call him. He sends her a friendly smile, and extends a welcoming hand.

"You must be Agent Jones," he says in way of greeting. She nods, and prays her palm isn't as sweaty as she thinks it is when she grasps his hand in a firm handshake.

"Agent Harkness, it's such an honour to meet you." He waves a dismissive hand, a distinct _psshawing _motion.

"Don't stand with the formalities. We're a team now. Call me Jack." She smiles tentatively at him, not quite sure how to respond. A living legend is before her, and has just instructed her to call him by his first name. She has studied and read and heard of his death-defying missions and exploits with Agent Smith's team – saving the world from North Korean nuclear bombs, preventing bloodbaths and further dissention in Africa, taking out Mafia kingpins and the biggest drug dealers. _Everyone_ knows what they have done, for Queen and for country.

Jack glances to the clock that hangs above the pantry to the far left of the room, and sighs when he notes that it is five minutes past eight. "I'm sorry about the Doctor – I assure you he isn't usually late. He's just…" He trails off, eyes distant. He has flipped open the mission file on the table before him, but she is sure that it is not the assignment that he sees. "He's just occupied now."

There is a lingering sadness, a tinge of grief that hangs like a thread in the room. She wants so badly to reach out and grasp it, but it is not for her to know, and she is sure that it will fray beneath her fingers. She is saved from having to formulate a response when the door opens.

Agent Smith enters the room, and for lack of a better word, she thinks he looks like _hell._ The handsomeness that the face hints at is hidden beneath the hollows in his cheeks, the tiredness on his face. He is lean and wiry and commanding and strong, but he carries the weight of the world on his shoulders, and it is slowly killing him. He sends her a tiny not-smile. It is a curve of the lips, a textbook smile that looks and acts like one, but it does not reach his eyes, and leaves his expression haunted.

She smiles back.

"Hey, mate," Jack greets, and reaching out to grasp the Doctor's hand in a gesture that speaks of years of friendship and familiarity. She does not comment at the way the action seems too much like drowning men reaching for life buoys, or lost souls grasping for direction.

"Right," the Doctor says. "Let's get on with this mission."

X-X

_0341hrs, Day Nine_

Agent Smith is one of the world's best sharpshooters, capable of taking out targets at eight hundred yards with strong winds. _The Doctor,_ they call him, for his surgical precision and methodical kills. He is the best in the MI6, and because he is the best, they cannot afford to lose him. He is the only double-zero agent to be assigned a three-man cell, consisting of a medic and a melee expert.

She knows that he is not ungrateful for it, and is not ungrateful for _them_, but she sometimes cannot help but feel that he _wants_ to die. She has never met a person with so little regard for his own welfare, safety or wellbeing, and his reckless stunts place him a hair's breadth away from death time and time again. She wonders what made him that way, what drives him to play the most dangerous game of all.

She wonders why Jack lets him.

She hears them, occasionally. They talk in the dead of the night, when the shadows run deep and they believe that she sleeps on. Their voices carry in the spartan safehouse they are currently staked out in, drifting-hanging in the stale air.

"I'm sorry," she hears one night. Jack's voice is laden with grief and pain, a mere whisper that echoes in the room. "I heard about it from Ianto, and I saw the dossier. I'm so, so sorry. I just –"

"Thank you," the Doctor's voice cuts in, abrupt and curt. Whatever this is, she knows that he does not want to talk about it. "But it's over now. Let's drop it."

They do, for a while. Long moments pass, like centuries in a second.

"It was my fault, you know." Jack's statement is sudden, almost a rushed confession. "I shouldn't have told you to take that assignment."

There is a long, long sigh, followed by a rustle as the Doctor stands and walks over to the tiny window. "No," he replies, voice heavy. "No. The fault is mine. I brought her with me, and I told her to stay in the room. I killed her, Jack."

Her heartbeat is loud in her ears.

"I killed her, and I don't know how I'm going to be able to live knowing that."

X-X

_1428hrs, Day Twenty-two_

Martha Jones learns quickly, and she does not forget things she learns easily. She knows that the Doctor will not speak of the past, that Jack will not tolerate questions about his personal life, that the Doctor will not talk about the-girl-she-replaces.

But they are on the edge of everything they have ever known, on the precipice of utter chaos and destruction and mayhem. They have no way out. The room that they have barricaded themselves in is sealed tight, with concrete walls three feet thick. The door is airtight, and there is no ventilation. This is the end, a sad finale for the team that should have done it all. She can almost hear the funeral dirges playing.

They sit in a row, backs against the wall facing the door, with no ammo and a diminishing supply of air. The sounds of machine-gun fire and rapid battering on the metal door are like the starting notes in their Auld Lang Synes, the first letters of their epitaphs.

There are a lot of things Martha Jones knows, but this is the end, so she will kiss goodbye to tact and caution and not-knowing.

"Who is she?" She asks the Doctor, because she resents this girl whose shoes she can never fill, detests her for being the reason she is found wanting in the eyes of the two men she wants validation from. He stiffens beside her, and his breath hitches. Jack watches their interaction with hooded eyes, piercing and searching.

She almost thinks he will not answer. The battering on the door changes, turning to a resounding _thump, thump, thump _of heavy artillery being fired at the door. They have nowhere else to run. This is the end of the line, and she thinks he almost looks forward to it.

Jack cuts in, as if to tell her off for daring to breach the parameters that she should know should never be crossed, but the Doctor sends him a silencing glance.

"Her name –" He pauses, like he has all the time in the world, like they are not about to meet their makers. "Her name was Rose."

_Agent Rose Tyler._ MI6's best field medic and operative. No one has not heard of her, or has not heard of the feats she has accomplished both with the Doctor and without. Martha frowns. "I wasn't aware that –"

"It's been covered up." When he cuts her off, it is a warning. _Do not go there._ It is a cautionary statement, designed to keep her from pushing more. Once, she would have listened, but what does she have to lose now?

"So she's dead?" She is not the most tactful person, she acknowledges, but when your life ends in minutes, tact is about as helpful as matchsticks in an inferno.

The Doctor turns away from her, and his silence is answer enough. Jack sighs, and breaks into the conversation.

"It's been papered over, because the other Agencies would have a field day if they knew that _The Bad Wolf_ was gone." She breaks away from staring at the Doctor's profile, and forces her eyes to meet Jack's.

"But no one has heard of her death. Surely no cover-up can be so complete? Even Director Jones is unaware."

Jack's eyes are dark. "The orders come from a power much higher than the Director. But I –" He breaks off, glances at the Doctor. He swallows once, expression flitting between indecision and pain before it turns resolved. "I saw the report myself. They found her body."

The Doctor's jaw is clenched, so tight that she fears it might crack. Jack chews on his bottom lip. "Or what was left of it, anyway."

The statement hangs in the fast-disappearing air around them, ghosts that scream and wail for vengeance. She has heard of Agent Tyler's achievements, and she has also heard the whispers of rumours that there was a lot more going on between Agent Tyler and Agent Smith than simple missions. _Salacious gossip,_ she had told herself, trying her best to ignore the twinge of envy at this _Rose Tyler_, who had everything she ever wanted.

Now, she isn't sure. The Doctor's clenched fist, taut jaw and whitened knuckles reveal a far more tragic tale, one that speaks volumes. Pain and grief and hurt at the loss of a comrade is natural, but something about the way he holds himself, aloof-disconnected-apart, hints at a great deal more than simple _companionship _and _work._ Her heart breaks for him.

They sit in silence, waiting for the lack of oxygen or the breakthrough of guns, whichever one kills them first. This is a pathetic way to die; out in a buried bunker in the Iraqi desert, miles from home, together but alone. They tell you of honourable deaths in service of God and Queen and Country back in the Academy, and they tell you of how glorious it is. _A glorious death._ She wants to laugh. No death is glorious, least of all theirs.

They will die unnamed, disavowed, undiscovered. In the end, no one ever dies for God or Queen or Country. You may honour God, serve your Queen and love your Country, but death cares nothing for those things. You die alone. Everyone dies alone.

"I told her to come with me," the Doctor whispers, voice hoarse and dry. The metaphorical noose tightens around their necks slowly, and though none of them are priests-that-can-absolve, a confession is one just the same. It will not get any of them to Heaven, they know, but that doesn't mean they have to carry their burdens with them down below. There are things they can never fully leave behind, and this is one of them for him, but maybe this will lighten the load a little.

"I told her, 'Rose Tyler and the Doctor, just as it should be.' And she listened." He runs tired hands down his equally tired face. "Why the hell did she listen? She should have known not to listen to anything I say. But she came anyway." His voice breaks, and falters as it trails off. Jack places a comforting hand on his shoulder.

"You couldn't have known what would happen. No one could. Don't blame yourself for this." The Doctor shakes his head, and continues on as if Jack never spoke.

"Did you know that she told me she loved me? And do you know what I said? I couldn't –" Jack watches the Doctor with widened eyes, shock apparent in them. "I couldn't say it back. So I told her, 'Quite right too.' And then I left the room. I left, Jack. Then they took her." Jack opens his mouth to reply, but the Doctor pushes on.

"They took her, and I killed all those bastards when I tracked them down. All nine of them. But it was too late." He slams his fist against the solid floor beneath them, and watches with faint disinterested curiosity as blood trickles down his knuckles. "I'm always too late."

She recalls reading a report of nine Serbian terrorists found dead in an abandoned warehouse, with signs of sustained and unspeakable torture. Her breath catches in her throat. "It was you. The Serbian terrorists – it was you who killed them, in cold blood."

The Doctor nods, and lifts his hand to examine his bleeding fist in closer detail. "It was unsanctioned. But they deserved it." He turns to look at her fully, and the fury banked in his eyes is terrifying. "And when I saw her remains, I wished I took longer with them." He wipes the blood on his knuckles off on his slacks. "They would have lived, you know. I would've given them a second chance, had they taken anyone other than her."

The battering on the door is louder now, and the wolves are drawing close. She closes her eyes, and tries to imagine that she is sitting on her sofa in her cushy apartment in West London, merely taking a short nap or a breather. She tries not to let her mind stray to what death feels like.

Jack, as always, tries to lighten things, no matter how hard it is. "Well, at least we'll be remembered as the stuff of legends, I suppose. That's one way to look at it."

_The stuff of legends,_ she thinks, and finds her thoughts drawn to the Doctor and his Rose, to their success and achievements and fame together, to the way they fit, like two pieces of a puzzle. She has always envied them, has always wished she were in their shoes.

She is glad for her ordinary life now.

_The stuff of legends,_ she knows, _is nothing but the fodder for nightmares and horror stories._

The door slams open.


	2. The Howling

A/N: This chapter is rated **Teen (Language/Implied Violence)**. Also, this fic is still open for requests! Just submit your Title, Prompt, and any Special Requests, and I'll see what I can do!

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><p><strong>2. The Howling<strong>

Prompt: Put the 'Bad' in Bad Wolf.

Prompter: **larxene_12** (on LJ)

Summary: _Oh, isn't this lovely, your blood on my skin, my madness on yours?_

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><p>The single fluorescent lamp swings slightly overhead, creaking with every parabolic action. The room is cast in the harsh white light it emanates, and the cracks in the walls and damp puddles on the floor are forcibly called to attention by the brightness.<p>

There is a woman, sitting in a chair. Her fingernails beat a _tap, tap, tap, tap_ rhythm against the metal surface of the wobbly table before her, and the chair beneath her squeaks in protest with each swing of an indolent leg. Mascara tracks are visible on her pale face, and her eyes are partially obscured by her dirty blonde hair. She taps her fingers in time to the faint _clink, clink, clink_ her handcuffs make as she shifts and moves.

He watches her from behind the one-way mirror, arms folded, brows creased. Next to him, glossy photographs of this same woman in the room before him lie spread out across a desk. The microphone in the interrogation room is sharp; he hears the _tap, tap_ of her nails, over and over again. It does nothing to help him think.

His head jerks up when the sound of the outer door opening is heard, and he visibly relaxes when he sees Lieutenant Harkness enter. He takes the file Jack proffers him.

Jack jerks his chin at the woman before them. "This the girl?"

He nods. Jack exhales, whistling as he does so. "They sure make serial killers different these days. You want me to start on her?"

He doesn't know why his fists are clenched, why his jaw is taut at Jack's simple offer to help him get the ball rolling. He wants to snap, _back off. This case is mine. This girl is mine._ But he doesn't, because he is under control. He always has things under control. And to be under control, he needs to be logical. Jack is one of the Met police force's best interrogators; it is only _logical_ that he be given a crack at what has proven to be the most elusive serial killer for several decades.

He wants to _screw logic_ and sock Jack in the jaw.

"Yeah, sure. You go ahead. Good luck."

X-X

He is there when she starts laughing. Her laughter is manic, high peals that echo and resonate around the spartan interrogation room. She clutches her stomach, laughing until she is heaving for breath, tears streaming down her cheeks. And still she continues laughing.

"Stop," Jack orders, furious. The interrogation has not been going well - she is too uncooperative, too far gone, too _batshit crazy_ to tell them anything, Jack says. The Doctor thinks she makes perfect sense to him.

He watches her laugh from behind the glass, watches the way she hoots and slaps the table in her mirth. She _fascinates_ him.

"Stop _right now._ Tell me, Miss Tyler, do you confess to killing thirty-seven innocent civilians in the course of the past seven months?"

She stops abruptly, tilting her head as she looks at Jack, as if contemplating his question. "Do you know," she begins, licking her lips and sending him a secret smile, "do you know that bloodstains are horribly hard to remove?" She leans back in her chair, raising her hands to study her nails. "No one told me that before. They should've. I would never have worn white." She sighs, in mock-disappointment-regret.

"Worn white? Worn white to what? Kill those thirty-seven people?" They need her to explicitly confess to her crimes, to give them definitive statements that will lead to definitive sentences. They have found no bodies, no murder weapons, no visible motives. Their evidence is entirely circumstantial. They have the _actus reus*_, but nothing that conclusively points it to her; they have no _mens rea*. _Their case is a dead end if they cannot get her to talk.

She pauses, studying Jack for several seconds. "Thirty-seven. I like that number. It has such a nice ring to it, don't you think? Thirty-seven people dead. It seems so hefty, so considerably. So _notable._" She grins at him, and Jack swears under his breath.

"Is that why you do it? For attention? So people will sit up and notice you? Why, Miss Tyler, are you sick of being the pampered little rich girl?"

She waves a dismissive hand. "No, no. I'm not rich," she informs him, eyebrows arched haughtily. "I'm _very_ rich."

"And you think that your wealth gives you the right to decide who gets to live or die?"

She shakes her head, slow side-to-side motions that seem oddly measured, carefully executed. "Mmm," she hums, the non-word decidedly inconclusive. "Maybe I only take out the bad seeds." Her eyes glint in the harsh light, making her seem like the wisest of men, or the most depraved of all. He cannot decide which category she falls into.

"Bad seeds," Jack picks up. "Is that why you call yourself the _Bad Wolf?_ Is that why you trace those words onto the walls of your victims' houses?"

Her eyes are shuttered now, hooded and brooding. She falls silent for drawn-out seconds. "Oh, Officer." She leans forward on the table, her handcuffs clinking against the table surface. "Do bad seeds produce fruit?"

"I don't know. You tell me."

Her finger traces patterns on the metal under her hand, pictures and drawings and answers only she can see. "They do," she tells him.

Her eyes glance up from where they had been concentrating on her wandering fingers. "There are fruit," she continues. She taps the table twice, almost as a sort of final note to their conversation. "Just bitter."

"I don't see how -"

She cuts Jack off, as if she never heard him speak in the first place. "It's funny how they tell you that life is sweet." Her eyes are curious on Jack's. "Did you have a good life, Officer?"

She doesn't wait for his reply. The Doctor thinks that she never wanted to hear one anyway. "No one ever told me I'd reap the bitter from the sweet." She breaks her gaze with Jack, and turns to look at the whitewashed wall to her right.

Jack slams a hand down onto the table between them, frustrated and stretched to his limit. "_Enough_. We'll resume this again, after we take a short break so you can ruminate on your fucking _depravity._"

"Yes, officer!" She shouts, a mockery of the words of assent they all learn in training. She tries to salute, but her hands are cuffed together, so she fumbles and fails. She descends back into giggles, and her moment of quasi-lucidity is lost.

A chair scrapes back, and Jack stands to storm out of the room.

"Officer," she calls once his back is turned. "Why don't you ask your friend to join us?" She gestures towards the Doctor, behind the reflective glass, tongue in cheek and a mysterious smile on her lips. She is facing him now, eyes on his even through the one-way mirror.

"I always say, more is merrier!" Jack has whirled back on her, and the Doctor is almost certain he sees a flash of fear run through his eyes before he slams out the door. Her eyes are still on his, piercing-searching-knowing.

She licks her lips, and her feet tap the floor, _tap, tap, tap, tap._

"Don't you just think that thirty-eight is so much better than thirty-seven?"

When his heartbeat quickens, he tries to tell himself it is entirely due to terror, and has nothing to do with the excitement that bubbles low in his gut, wrong and sick and utterly _crazy_.

_So perfect,_ he thinks.

X-X

When they resume, it is his turn to interrogate her. Jack's shift has ended, and he tries to clamp down on the pleasure that surges through him at the knowledge that he will have her _all to himself._

He enters the room, her dossier and case file in hand. She looks up when he enters, like she never did when Jack entered. He caresses her glossy, _beautiful,_ _perfect_, face in the mugshot when he opens her file. She smiles at him, in real life.

He smiles back.

"So, Miss Tyler. Do you have anything you want to tell me?"

She leans in towards him, and gestures for him to do the same. He complies, because she is intriguing and fascinating and so, so wonderful, like broken-smiling porcelain dolls and fluttering butterflies just before they are pinned down.

"Call me Rose," she whispers into his ear, and he knows this is a complete breach of protocol - never refer to the accused by their first name; _they are not your friends,_ never allow physical contact; _they are dangerous,_ never show weakness; _they will take it and twist it and fuck you up._

He turns his head, and his face is a hair's breadth from hers. He can feel her breath, warm and ghosting over his cheek. He leans in further, touching his lips to the shell of her ear.

"Rose," he murmurs, and is sure that he does not imagine the shiver that runs through her body.

He leans back, and her eyes follow the movement. "Rose," he begins. "Oh, Rose. Tell me. Why do you do it?"

She cocks her head to the side, her eyes weighty and measured on his. They are not mad, not depraved. They are, he believes, simply misunderstood.

"They mean nothing," she starts. "They are just _there_. Just going on with their lives, day after day after day after day. And they don't matter. They never will. I don't hate them, I don't like them. They are _just there_. So I think, _what are their lives to me?_ Nothing. They don't mean a thing. So why not?"

He is transfixed, watching her mouth as it moves and shapes and forms words and syllables and sounds. "Why not?" he acquiesces, and they both fall silent.

She sighs after a while, a motion that stretches out into long, dusty lines in time. "I'm crazy," she tells him, and her eyes are sad-mirthful-shattered-whole on his, things he cannot comprehend, things he will never be able to. She is an enigma, as deliciously _bad_ as the Bad in Bad Wolf, and wonderfully complicated; the greatest temptation for him, the world's most avid puzzle-solver and problem-fixer.

"Sometimes," he says, tracing his fingers on her open palm, "sometimes, that's the best way to live."

She watches him, eyes curious, interest piqued. "You think so?"

He draws an X on her palm, a symbol that carries no meaning, not really, yet says it all. "I know so."

They return to the comfort of silence.

She is the one who breaks it again, with the _tap, tap, tap_ of her feet against the floor. Her eyes are on him, but he gets the distinct feeling that she sees _through_ him. They are more than a detective and his suspect, more than a priest and a confessor, more than a man and a woman at this point.

"Do you want to know how I kill them?" she asks, and the question is hollow, though it is a victory. _A pyrrhic one,_ he thinks, though he doesn't quite know why.

"Tell me," he says, and finds that he is more curious than he should professionally be. He cannot bring himself to care, or to worry, or to wonder what this might mean, because she is so utterly _fantastic,_ and beyond-this-world, so haphazardly-cobbled, so fluid-solid.

She spreads her hands on the table, palms down, stretching her fingers as wide as they can go. She looks as if she is about to begin a sweeping sonata, or an epic symphony-in-staccato. She meets his eyes head on.

"First," she says, and draws a number _one_ on the table surface, "I slice them up. Little cuts, you see. Nothing too deep or long - just enough to get it nice and bloody. Not too many too - maybe fourteen or fifteen? I don't know. If they make me angry, I cut them more." She shrugs, like they are discussing the weather, or the price of a kilo of fish in the market, like they are not discussing death, not talking about cold murder and destruction.

He nods anyway, as if he understands. Maybe, he thinks, he really does. He is sure he does.

"Then," she continues, and strokes a curling _two_ onto the shiny metal of the table. "then, I stab them through the heart." She giggles. "A shot through the heart, you know? Like that song. I love that song." He clears his throat, and she pauses, blinking rapidly. "Do you like that song?"

"I guess," he replies, and his grin is boyish. "And you're to blame."

She beams back at him, this girl-woman-killer, and he thinks the wisdom-madness that flashes in her eyes are like winking stars, probably already burnt out but still shining here, light-years away.

She blows a raspberry, and her fingers dance on the table, like a pianist in the throes of a soul-consuming movement. "I collect the blood, too," she tells him, and her voice is admonishing, like he is a schoolboy who has forgotten something important. "You didn't ask me that."

"Ah," he says, and his fingers tap a distinct four-four beat, keeping metronomic rhythm for her soundless sonata. "So I didn't."

"It's not nice to forget," she sniffs at him, almost disdainfully. "It's blood on walls, after all. Very morbid stuff. Very dramatic."

"Mmm," he tells her. "Like red markers of fate, no?"

She grants him a beatific smile.

"Exactly."

X-X

There are many things that happen in between. Things that matter and don't, and are really the same thing. But this is the end, and what do all those things matter now? This is the finale, the brightest blaze to exit in. This is the madness in lucidity, the understanding in confusion.

"You helped me," she tells him, whispering the words close to his ear. Her breath is warm on his cheek, and she yanks him up by the lapels of his coat to kiss him full on the mouth. It is searing, branding and consuming, a veritable inferno in the frozen winter.

He tastes blood on her tongue, metal-sweet and bitter-salty. He tastes life, and _folies a deux_, and twisted fairytales. He tastes _her._ When she breaks away, there are tears in her eyes.

"I love you," she says, and the first cut she makes on his skin is the sweetest.

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><p>*Every crime consists of two parts: an <em>actus reus<em> (the action of the crime itself), and a _mens rea_ (the intention/premeditation to commit that crime). For a criminal case to be solid, prosecutors need to prove both.


	3. Stars

A/N: Completely in dialogue.

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><p><strong>3. Stars<strong>

Prompt: The Doctor and Rose are astronomers! And yay fluff and silliness!

Prompter: **sweetevangeline** (on LJ)

Summary: _She really hopes she gets to kiss him before he gets arrested for hacking the Hubble Telescope. Jack, as usual, isn't helping things._

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><p>*Note: In modern practice, the term 'astronomer' is interchangeable with 'astrophysicist' - there is no distinction between them. AstronomersAstrophysicists are highly-educated individuals, with PhDs in physics or astronomy.

"No, Rose, see here - if you look at the scatter of astral debris around Ursa Major, you'll find that there are distinct parallels between the debris field there and here, around Earth."

"I don't see how that augments your argument regarding positrons."

"Right, right, look - beyond the structural similarities found there, they share atomic traits too."

"Your finger's blocking the star cluster."

"Oops, yeah, sorry. But look!"

"Mmm, yeah, I see it. No antiparticles either, huh."

"None! Exactly the same as this!"

"Move. Your. Finger."

"...sorry."

"Did you look at the new readings from Jack's department, though? That explains things."

"Oh, you mean the study of the particle decay rates?"

"Yeah, that one. It explains the lack of planetary destruction every time something collides in space."

"No, but - what?"

"Donna's calling you. I think you're in trouble."

"Oh. Shit."

X-X

"So what did she want?"

"I may or may not have tinkered with the console panel controls for the Hubble Telescope, resulting in it taking five hundred and forty-seven images of Buckingham Palace."

"Oh, that's not too bad."

"I know! That's what I tried to tell her! But she said that MI6 and the Queen's Guard don't see things that way, and are both after me now. Something about 'breaching the privacy of the Royals' and 'violating international treatises' and endangering national security."

"Not to mention the part where you tinkered with the Hubble Telescope."

"Yeah, that too, I guess."

"Don't you think that part deserves at least some mention?"

"I suppose. It was some fine work I did there. I helped them to solve that kink in the visible light meter, you know?"

"I'm sure they're all positively bubbling with gratitude."

"Rose, sarcasm isn't nice."

"Neither is tinkering with another nation's telescope."

"I fractionally concede your point, though I still say they needed my help. But at least Donna hasn't found out that I hacked the Russian satellites yet."

"Ahh. That's still better than Jack's hacking into the Chinese defence system, though."

"Ha, yeah, that one was a real laugh."

"It almost got him deported and shot."

"...that's still quite funny."

"In your twisted mind, maybe."

"I'll have you know that my mind is perfectly sane and renowned-ly brilliant."

"Renowned-ly isn't a word."

"Is too."

"Is not."

"Is too."

"Oh, Jesus Christ. Jack, help me out here."

"Hey, love. What's the Doctor up to now? Heard about your Russian satellites, by the way. Nice job, mate!"

"See, Rose, someone appreciates what I do!"

"Go away, Doctor. I'm busy."

"Why do all of you call me the Doctor, anyway? Isn't it kinda confusing? I mean, aren't all of us Doctors here?"

"I hope that question was rhetorical, because the three of us went to university together, and I would be really worried if you forgot that already."

"God, guys, remember those brownies? I miss those brownies. On another note, Doc, none of us have crap names like yours."

"What? John Smith is a highly respectable and dignified name!"

"Pfffft. It's also the most common first name and last name in England. Ergo, it is the most common name overall. I would know. I use that name all the time when I love 'em and leave 'em."

"Ewwww. Jack, go away too. I don't want to hear you men talk about your disgusting sexual exploits. And those brownies of yours had so much crap in them, you were high all the time."

"Oh, Rose, darling. You know I only sleep with those women - and men - because you won't sleep with me. Why don't you just give me a chance? You can make a reformed man out of me! So, what do you say?"

"I say - Jack, stop wiggling your eyebrows. It's creepy."

"Hey, hey, hello, can we get back to focusing on our jobs here? You and him sleeping together aside, can someone please show me the reports on the particle decay study?"

"Whoa. What crawled up your arse and died there?"

"Yeah, Doctor. Are you alright? Since when have you ever taken work seriously?"

"Rose, you wound me! I take a lot of things seriously!"

"Sure you do."

"I do!"

"Uh huh."

"No, I really, truly, absolutely, whole-heartedly do!"

"I'm agreeing with you."

"ROSE, STOP THAT."

"What? Don't you want me to agree with you?"

"I do, just - ARGH. Jack, stop smirking right now."

"Oh, you two lovebirds are just too cute."

"We're not -"

"Rose and I aren't -"

"Doctor, make Jack go away."

"No, no, don't worry. No need for that! I'll leave you two googly-eyed lovers to go dance or something."

"Right."

"Okay."

"Hey, Doctor, you forgot to get those study results from Jack."

"Bugger."

X-X

"Right, so what you're saying is that the twenty microsecond time difference in decay between the matter and antimatter accounts for the survival of the universe as we know it and for the complete lack of antimatter around?"

"Exactly."

"I don't see how that can fully account for the absolute lack of antimatter, though. It would be a mathematical impossibility."

"Not an impossibility. An improbability, maybe."

"But we're talking absolutes here. If the universe is infinite - and we both agree that it is, and constantly expanding - then how can there be absolutes? The mathematics is boggling."

"We're not talking about parallel universes or dimensions here, the mathematics for that isn't as twisted - it's just a simple thing: matter and anti-matter, and the decay rates."

"Think about it, though. If Schrodinger could prove the probability of parallel universes because of the infinite nature of -"

"Both of you, SHUT UP. Can't we all just observe this planetary alignment in peace and silence?"

"Sorry, Rose."

"Yeah, sorry, Rose."

"...hey, I was thinking -"

"Oh, that's got to be a first for you, Jack!"

"Low blow, Doctor, low blow."

"Couldn't resist."

"Anyway, I was thinking that we should all go to the party later! Just like old times."

"I highly doubt that anything we did in the 'old times' remotely resembles going to an office party in honour of an exceedingly rare planetary alignment."

"Come on, Doctor. We haven't done anything fun in ages! We're always in this lab -"

" - because this is where we work, you know -"

" - and I haven't gone out in forever - "

" - I point out that you went clubbing two days ago - "

" - plus you're such a stick in the mud - "

" - I hacked the Hubble telescope and Russian satellites, how much more do you want - "

" - and you never go with me to all those places - "

" - hey, I followed you to that boring convention on astral bodies and quantum mechanics - "

" - and you only go with me when I ask, how do you think that makes a girl feel, huh - "

" - well how else am I supposed to know when to go with you? You always - "

"Oh my god, watching you two is better than going to the movies, seriously. Both of you banter like an old married couple. Rose, honey, you're blushing, and Doctor, you can stop glaring at me now. Well, go ahead, continue! Don't mind me - I'm just here for the entertainment."

"Is that popcorn? Where did you even -"

"Can I have some?"

"Doctor, no, don't encourage him."

"...but I like popcorn."

"Jack, don't -"

"Thanks, mate."

"Anytime, Doc."

X-X

"Did you see that? How could he just let her slobber all over him like a fawning puppy?"

"Rose, darling, jealousy is not attractive on you."

"But she -"

"And I happen to know that Reinette is, in fact, a very good kisser. Even if she has slept with over half the men in this room."

"You're disgusting."

"You're jealous."

"Urgh. Swine."

"Better a pig than a green-eyed monster."

"Wait - you said she's slept with over half the men in this room..?"

"Don't pry, sweetie."

"...you're going to tell me anyway."

"Damn. Yeah, fine, so I slept with her. Once. Look, we were both drunk! I'm sorry!"

"No, no, shut up, not you. I don't want to know if you slept with her."

"What do you - Oh. Oh. No, I don't think so. She's been after him forever. I'm sure she'd gloat if she ever got her little red claws into him."

"Good. Okay, quiet, quiet! They're coming this way. Hi, Reinette. Nice, uh, earrings."

"Since when do you even notice earrings? Yeah, hey, Reinette. Good to see you. You're looking gorgeous. How're you?"

"Oh, Jack, you're such a flatterer, as always. The Doctor here was just regaling me with his theory on positron existence! Fascinating work, really. And oh, hi, Rose. How's your research on the quark theory coming along?"

"It's fine, all good. Going well. Very well. I'm, umm, going to get some wine now, so if you'll excuse me..."

"I thought you said that your study was going -"

"No, Doctor, my study is going fine. Right, heading off for wine now..."

"But you just said earlier today that -"

"It's positively brilliant. Now will you let me go? I need to go get wine."

"Wow. She must be really thirsty or something. I don't think I've ever seen Rose walk that fast in heels."

"Oh, Doc. You're such a piece of work. You really know how to screw things up, don't you?"

"Hey, hey now. What does that even mean?"

"It means, buddy-o, that you're a major idiot. He is un imbécile."

"Jack, just because I'm French doesn't mean I can't understand English perfectly, you know."

"Thought I'd translate it for you, just in case."

"Thanks, Jack. How thoughtful."

X-X

"There you are. I've been looking all over for you!"

"Sure you were. Why, finally managed to pry your little French tart off you?"

"She wasn't -"

"Nevermind. I'm sorry, that was a cheap shot. Forget I said anything, Doctor."

"Look, if this is about earlier with Reinette, I was only -"

"It's alright. It really is. You don't have to elaborate, not to me."

"Yes, yes I do. You never get anyone else get a word in edgeways, you know? You jump to conclusions so fast that you always think you have it all figured out before everyone else. Here I am, trying to talk to you, and you cut me off. You always do that. Why can't you just listen? Reinette doesn't mean anything, okay? We worked together on last month's lunar eclipse study and the Orbiter-4 project, so I was only asking for her opinion on the positron-electron imbalances."

"Didn't you ask Jack and I about that already?"

"I did, yes, but -"

"But that's not enough, is it? We aren't. We never are."

"Rose, don't -"

"It's alright, Doctor. I get it. It's fine. We're fine. We always are, yeah? I'm sorry, I've got to go, I told Mickey that -"

"That Doctor Smith can bloody well wait. Why is it that I'm always the last one you come to when you have a problem? I thought we were best friends, Rose."

"Yes, we are. Best friends. Wonderful. Absolutely fantastic. Yay, friends."

"I mean, I know that you and Jack are, well, together and everything, but that doesn't mean that -"

"Wait, what? Jack and I? Since when? Where did you even hear that?"

"Huh? Since he transferred here from NASA..?"

"Jack and I have never dated. Do you seriously think I'd go out with someone who make it him mission to sleep with every living thing that moves?"

"So you and Jack have never..?"

"No."

"Oh, right. That's good to know. Thank god. And you and Mickey..?"

"We broke up two years ago, Doctor. I told you. I've told you at least a dozen times now."

"I know, I know. I just thought that what with your close proximity to him on the black matter study, old feelings would resurface or something."

"Oh, sweet Circe. For someone so brilliant, you sure are daft, aren't you?"

"Hey, I resent that statement wholeheartedly. I'm a MENSA member -"

"Yeah, yeah, we all know. So is Jack, by the way. But no. Stop. Close your mouth. This is my turn to talk. Okay, good. Now: who do I spend the most time with everyday?"

"Me?"

"Yes, clever boy! So from there, picking up on your ridiculous assumption that proximity breeds romantic notions, who should I then be the most interested in?"

"Well, uh, me."

"Good job! You're such a smart kid."

"Wait, so you're saying that -"

"Shut up and kiss me."


	4. A Study of Strangers

A/N: A more modern and quiet take on our favourite couple, because I've realised that I tend to place them in extreme situations - I wanted to explore their relationship in a more ordinary, sedate and tempered setting. A key influence in this is the awesome movie _Up_! Also, _Caffe Nero_ is a major coffeehouse here in the UK.

* * *

><p><strong>4. A Study of Strangers<strong>

Prompt: "There is no end to the adventures that we can have if only we seek them with our eyes open." - Jawaharlal Nehru

Prompter: **firewordsparkler**

* * *

><p>The first thing she remembered when she woke up was pain. It was branding, searing, a consuming inferno that coursed through her right leg and left her gasping in its wake.<p>

There was noise and movement after the pain. Muffled voices and staccato beeps registered faintly in the periphery of her consciousness, and the blurred figures spun and tilted her world out of balance. There were shouts too, raised voices and angry words that she couldn't decipher through the haze of her thoughts and vision.

But the pain. There was so much pain. Every breath, every infinitesimal movement sent her nerves screaming for reprieve that eluded her at every turn. When the pain became too much, she moaned and voiced her agony.

"She's awake. Check her vitals."

"Holding steady. Heart rate slightly elevated."

Beyond the retreat of her eyelids, the world was bright and sterile-white. It burned her eyes. When her vision swam into focus, she was met with the sympathetic, cloyingly soothing gazes of doctors and nurses clustered around her bed.

"Miss Tyler," one of the staff said. "Please don't be alarmed. You're currently in the Royal Brompton Hospital."

Her throat was dried-out, parched and sore, but she needed to know, needed to find out what was going on. Images and distant memories whirled in the confusion of her mind, like puzzle pieces that kept falling out of her hand.

It took all of her strength to croak out words. "What happened?"

She did not fail to miss the loaded glance that was exchanged between her attending doctor and the nurse that had spoken up. Her heart clenched in fear and trepidation as warning-alarming bells shrieked and whirred to life in the recesses of her mind.

The attending doctor patted her hand. "Maybe you should just take it slow for a while. Just rest and get better. Someone will -"

"No. Tell me now. I need to know. What happened?"

The nurse cleared her throat, and rifled through the clipboard in her hands, obviously stalling.

"Well, you see, during your performance, there - well. Miss Tyler, your leg was broken."

Relief was a sharp flame through her body. "Oh, that's - yes. That's good. Thank goodness that's all."

The doctor took her hand, a gesture meant to comfort, to soothe. It felt like the gesture of a herder leading the cattle to the abattoir.

"Miss Tyler. I'm afraid it's hardly as simple as that, unfortunately. You see, your femur was shattered when he - during the unhappy accident. You've been unconscious for several hours now. From what we can see, you will have to be confined to bed rest for the next few weeks or so, and that means that by the time you're up and walking again, well -"

There was a pregnant pause, an uncomfortable overhanging silence. "By the time you get back on your feet, the muscles in your thigh would have atrophied. You won't - you won't be able to dance again."

She swallowed hard, and the action grates her dry throat. "You're joking, right?"

"I'm so sorry, Miss Tyler. I'm afraid not."

X-X

_ROYAL BALLET PRINCIPAL DANCER'S CAREER BRUTALLY ENDED_

_BYE-BYE BALLERINA: TRAGIC CAREER-END_

_ON-STAGE DRAMA, REAL-LIFE HORROR_

_THE DEATH OF THE ROYAL BALLET'S ROSE_

It was unbearable. The media circus dragged on for weeks, camping outside the hospital she was in and staking out her apartment. Her hospital room smelt perennially of flowers. People trooped in, endless streams of them, to wish her well and to express heartfelt sympathies. Cards flooded in.

It felt like a funeral.

Maybe in some way it really was. Her life as she knew it had ended, and all doors, once thrown open and waiting for her, were now shut.

What was she, if not a ballerina?

She had started classes from the age of four. She had joined the Royal Ballet's corps when she was fourteen. By nineteen, she was principal dancer.

At twenty-five, her career was over.

She has no idea what to do now. Dedication to the art has left her with little friends outside of the troupe, and with the season starting back up, they have little time for her.

Five months. Five long, arduous months have passed, and she is no more clearer about what to do with her life than when prima danseur Owen Harper broke her leg in a drug-induced hallucination during the opening performance of Giselle.

She fled to France, Spain, Greece, and now to New York. But you cannot outrun your demons, especially not when they come in the form of a nine-inch puckered scar on your thigh. When she is particularly cynical, she muses that she cannot even run at all, not with one dud leg.

It is midnight in the Big Apple when she touches down at JFK. The shift in timezones has her jet-lagged, but she puts off sleep. She has had enough bed rest and sleep and convalescence to last a lifetime.

New York. A global cultural hotspot, home to Broadway and famed ballet troupes. It is a glaring, glittering reminder of the life that was cruelly torn from her.

But she has brooded long enough, and it is time for her to move on. Almost half a year of self-pity and anger is enough for one person. Her successful years in the industry left her with quite the nest egg; she can travel, see the world. She can finally do all the things she never had the time to. She can relax and indulge her hobbies, laze around and discover herself.

_Find out who you are underneath the ballerina_, her therapist had told her. But how? The words are remarkably easy for Dr. Jones to throw about, almost trite. It is a far more difficult task in reality. For someone who has given her life, her every waking moment to ballet and the perfection of the art, she feels like a reborn soul, a newborn baby, an unsteady foal without it.

Rose Tyler is many things, and an ex-ballerina is now one of them. But one thing that she knows for certain is that she is not a complainer, and she is not a quitter.

She will find herself, she promises.

X-X

_You're Rose Tyler, aren't you?_

_Yes - yes, I am._

_Oh my god. I read about the incident in the papers. It must have been horrifying. I'm so sorry for -_

_Thank you._

She is healing now, one slow step at a time. There are nights that still has her lurching from her bed, sheets tangled around flailing limbs, a scream dying in her throat.

But those nights are fewer and less frequent, and even if she still cannot smile easily, she will deem it a huge victory. She likes New York. The sheer size of the metropolis lends her the obscurity that eludes her in London, and in the sea of the masses, she can pretend that she is like one of the hurried pedestrians around her, purposeful and full of direction.

She first meets him at Times Square, at six-eighteen in the evening on a cool Tuesday. She stands off to the side, gazing unseeingly at the crowds. He walks up to her, and when he speaks, it is as if she has known him forever. He talks to her like a friend from bygone days, like a fondly-remembered lover.

"Ah, there you are!"

She frowns at first, swivelling her head around to check if he is addressing someone behind her. When her quick survey turns up nothing, she opens her mouth to ask if he has identified her wrongly, but a quick motion of his hand has her shutting it again.

"Come on, let's go grab some coffee. It's too bloody cold to be out in this weather."

He is British. His accent is distinct, a lilted Estuary English that makes her think of tea and scones and the Thames and Big Ben and _home_. He reaches for her hand, and when hers slides easily into his, she finds herself wondering if she is insane for following this utter stranger.

"Are you sure you've got the right person?" She asks, because this might be slightly creepy, she thinks, especially when she reviews the situation: random stranger accosts her, drags her off for coffee and she barely struggles.

He sends her a mischievous side glance. "Oh, yeah. I'm sure."

A thousand questions fly through her mind. _Who are you? What do you want? Where did you come from?_ But he feels so familiar, so right that she stops the words before they tumble out and trails behind him to a nearby Starbucks.

The coffee-lover's mecca is packed with the dinner crowd, and it takes some skillful hustling and twisting to fight their way through to the counter to place their orders and grab a seat.

"What I would give for a good 'ol _Caffe Nero_ now, eh?" He winks at her, and no one is more surprised than she is when she returns his grin in full force.

"That's - that's my first smile in three months," she sputters out, and he raises his eyebrows and lets out a low whistle.

"Well, we'll just have to make up for it tonight then, won't we?" She cannot help but laugh at his easy charm and friendliness that chips away at her brittle shell, piece by steady piece.

"You do realise that you've failed to tell me your name," she tells him, sending him a half-smile to soften her mild admonishment.

"Ah, that is correct. How astute, milady! I'm John," he says. "John Smith, at your service."

She blinks.

"Wait - seriously? I mean, I _know_ that John and Smith are the most common first and surnames in Britain respectively, but I've never actually come across someone with _both_ in their name."

He guffaws, and his laughter is infectious and so, so full of life. She can almost believe that she is happy now. She laughs along with him.

"Yes, seriously. My name is John Smith, unfortunately. But enough about me. What's yours?"

"Far more exotic, I assure you. I'm Rose." She tries to prevent her knuckles from whitening on the white chocolate frappe in front of her, but the tension that creeps into her body tells her that she is fooling no one. He does not miss the way she deliberately leaves out her last name, and he does not press. She is not the only one with ghosts here tonight.

"So, Rose. What's your story?" She freezes, and sips on her frappe for long moments in an attempt to still her racing pulse.

"Oh, you know," she begins, waving her hands dismissively. "Change of careers, decided to see the world in between, that sort of thing. What about you?"

He smiles at her, and it is a secret smile, one that hints at stories untold and mysteries-under-the-surface.

"Oh, you know," he mimics, and she laughs a little at this, "Just in town for a conference, decided to befriend a random woman, that sort of thing."

"Ah," she acknowledges, and they share a grin. "An exciting life, I see. So where to, after New York? Where will you go to pursue that next great adventure?"

He theatrically shrinks back in horror, clasping his hands to his heart, as if fatally wounded. She tries to quell her giggles as surrounding patrons send them curious looks.

"Rose, oh, Rose!" he cries dramatically, and she shakes her head in mock exasperation, rolling her eyes at his antics. "How can you say such a thing? Oh, what blasphemy!" He leans across the table towards her, and she follows suit. They look like two conspirators.

"Rose," he begins. "Let me tell you a secret: Adventure is everywhere! Out there, in here, around us! _There is no end to the adventures that we can have if only we seek them with our eyes open_ - if we choose to _see_ them and grasp life with both hands."

She nods in exaggerated solemn understanding, and he sends her a wide smile. She purses her lips as she considers her next move. The question hangs on the tip of her tongue, begging to be asked. She decides to throw caution to the wind. What use is caution to her now? When has caution ever served her well?

"Why me?" She asks. "Of all the people at the Square, why did you pick me?"

"Oh, well -" He shifts in his seat, and looks distinctly uncomfortable.

"You looked sad," he tells her.

She smiles at him, at this stranger-from-nowhere; lifetimes of knowing and understanding and familiarity between them. She reaches for the napkin across the table, and pulls a Sharpie from her purse.

With infinite care, she traces a bold _Adventure_ onto the pristine surface, and signs off with a flourish.

"Well," she says. "I'm not, not anymore." She stands up, and extends her hand towards him, wiggling her fingers.

He takes it.


End file.
